An Off Duty Day
by Subterraneangem
Summary: An intricately engraved cyberrylium box can hold a wealth of interesting things. Memories, for example. Hilarity. Bliss. Candy. Such a box, Terabyte would quickly learn, could even contain all of these things. And what a wonderful thing that is. Prime/AU, One-shot for Duty and Deceit.


**An Off Duty Day**

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><p><strong>This one-shot has been quite happily written at the request of my sister enmused. The following cuteness was also influenced by the awesomeness of holiday time. Happy New Year.<strong>

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><p><em>The ship flew slowly towards the surface of the cold, far moon. It could only be seen from Cybertron once in a lunar cycle, during its short, one joor long, full moon. The young femme major sat calmly in her small seat on the shuttle; able - for the most part - to ignore the sharp red-edged elbow that was currently pressed into her abdomen.<em>

_She smiled behind her mask at the large army green jet beside her, to whom the elbow belonged. On her other side she had another elbow jabbed into her abdomen. This one was - in design - an exact mirror image of the green one, aside from it being navy, edged with brass. _

_The owner of this other elbow was quite pointedly trying to pretend she didn't exist. But that was very typical. She may have finally earned his respect by surviving the Autobot 'Terror Twins', but as far as Dreadwing was concerned, that changed very little. He didn't like her too much. From what she could tell, his only reason for disliking her was because Skyquake did like her. _

_Since the two mechs were telepathically linked, that made things somewhat tense between the three of them._

_The Prussian blue and black femme stared at her pedes. She figured they'd had another heated discussion on that matter, but neither mech was eager to fill her in. It probably ended the way it always did. Dreadwing saying she wasn't worthy of their time, much less being called a friend. Skyquake saying his twin was just jealous that he was now splitting his time. Dreadwing concluding that Sky would have to choose between them._

_She snorted, drawing a curious glance from her right and a dark, silencing glare from her left. As if that was a choice. The other half of your spark, or a little femme you just happened to meet one day. To her, family was more important than anything else. She had no doubt who she'd choose. She had tried to warn Skyquake. _

_Not that he'd listened._

_Her mostly empty tanks rumbled embarrassingly loudly. She ought to have refueled before the mission... Just then Skyquake spoke up, "Terabyte... We have something for you."_

_She raised a curious optic ridge. Had they finally found an answer to their argument? Were they going to tell her? Keeping a mildly curious tone, she said, "Oh?"_

_Her friend reached behind her to give his twin an encouraging rap on the helm. Huffing in annoyance, Dreadwing tried to ignore him. "Dre-ead! You said you'd do it!"_

_The blue mech grunted again, glaring down at her. "What if I want it for myself?"_

_Gold optics widened in surprise and she replayed his question back through her helm for confirmation. He had just teased his twin back. Out loud. Dreadwing._

_Skyquake laughed his deep, gravelly laugh at her expression. "Come on, quit being such a glitch-hog, Dread. You already agreed."_

_"Did nothing of the sort." The blue jet muttered. _

_The spy grinned behind her mask. What could be so good as to make Dreadwing act like this? Curiosity overwhelmed her, both at the gift and the normally high-and-mighty mech. _

_"Here." Dreadwing said finally, thrusting a beautifully etched silver box into Skyquake's hand. Apparently they had had a silent discussion in which the blue mech had been persuaded. _

_Skyquake smirked at her, gently - not so gently - nudging her with his elbow as he turned to face her as much as possible in the small chairs. He rubbed his thumb over the box's ornate clasp before setting it reverently into her hands. _

_Carefully, the femme ran a dainty, clawed silver servo over the swirling designs. Each etched stroke was masterfully carved into its cyberrylium surface. It was so beautiful, so familiar. Memories of her youngling-hood flooded her mind as she studied the box. Tetrastar and Bullwing playing with her and eachother, a blueish box like this one in every room._

_Her mother brought one or two of these beautiful boxes home every orn from the factory where she worked. Skyquake's encouraging voice broke her from her thoughts._

_"You going to open it?" _

_She shook her helm to clear her thoughts, bringing her mind back to the present. Her mask came down so she could smile at him widely, optics glittering excitedly, "I haven't seen these in vorns! Where did you find them?"_

_He smiled, chuckling at her excitement, "How do you know what I've got inside? You won't know what's in it until you open it."_

_"You wouldn't do that to me..." She stated her sparkfelt opinion, but when Sky kept smiling, worry touched her voice. "Would you?"_

_Dreadwing sat unmoving beside her. He still didn't like her. She often wondered if the jet would ever tolerate her. But right now her focus was on the elaborately engraved container. Finally she unclasped the box and, taking a deep vent hoping beyond hope that the box held what she thought it did, the femme looked inside. _

_Her expression must have been hilarious, but she didn't really care. She squealed like the youngling that she would have still been if it hadn't been for what happened at Protihex. In a sparkling's excitement, she snatched a handful of the Protihexian silver drops, unwrapping them with all the skill of one who'd eaten far more than she needed. _

_She then proceeded to stuff four or five of them into her mouth. There was something peculiarly wonderful about the silver ore below Protihex that simply couldn't be found in any other city-state. When the handful of silver drops had melted partially, a sheepish expression touched her face and she grinned at Skyquake, her cheeks bulging slightly._

_"Sawwy... Dey's soooo good! Dank-oo! Havlen't had deese in f'rev'r." She said, trying semi-successfully to speak around the five silver drops crammed in her mouth._

_At this, both mechs burst into boisterous laughter. Each mech reached over at the same time, each grabbing several silver drops, devouring them in similar fashion to hers. Soon all three of them were basking in the wonderful flavor of Protihexian silver drops. _

_Way too much candy later, Skyquake reached over to grab another handful, only to be stopped by a playful slap on the wrist from the laughing little femme, whose mouth was still deliciously full. She giggled around the candy, excessive sweets reacting like high grade in her systems, especially with her tanks so empty. _

_"N'ver said'oo mechs could 'ave any..." She giggled again, glancing wistfully down at the three-quarters of the way empty box of candies. In spite of the fact that her mouth was still packed with the candies. This trip ought to end fast or they'd eat all of it. Or rather she would. And mostly had already. "Dey's mine!"_

_Nevertheless, even in her hyper, younlingish state of mind, the spy didn't dare to slap Dreadwing's hand away in the same manner. They were all in good moods, and she for one wasn't going to spoil it. _

_The ship's hydraulics hissed loudly as the Confiscator finished its landing sequence. A high-pitch squeal filled the air, making her sensitive audials ache as the air pressure was slowly released so that they wouldn't damage their systems by going from high pressure to no pressure in less than an astrosecond._

_Across from them, three other mechs sat strapped into the chairs the same as she was. They were just waiting for the pressure to equalize so they could safely exit. As well as looking at them all like they were was to be a simple scouting expedition, making sure the Autobots hadn't claimed the moon. If the moon was unclaimed, then the Decepticons would take possession. If the moon was claimed... well, the Decepticons would still take possession._

_After several breems of the insistent scream of the airlocks, the pilots came back to where they were, unclasping each of them one by one. The three mechs across from her were sent out first, responsible for the north and west half of the moon. She and the jet twins were in charge of the dark side of the moon._

_The pilot ushered the out of the Conficator, muttering something about electro-magnetic interference poking holes in their subspace and crazy commanders on sweet-high. Once they were a good distance away from the ship, the mech grinned slyly at them. "You ever done the whole insta-jump pocket space-bridge thing before?"_

_Dreadwing, speaking for all of them, said, "The what?"_

_The vague, gray mech laughed raucously, slamming a button into each of their hands, activating each device as he did so. The little spy barely had time to register that Dreadwing had vanished into thin air, when she saw that Skyquake had as well. She scowled at the laughing mech whose paint was the color of death._

_"Wh-" _

_The world seemed to swirl in all directions until all of a sudden the spinning ceased, leaving her equilibrium systems all out of whack. She landed in a heap beside a green lump and a blue lump exactly the same. Everything else was white and glowy. Disoriented, the young femme looked up at the green lump that was Skyquake questioningly._

_"What just...?" She trailed off quietly as her optics rebooted and she saw this luminescent white twilight world through clear optics. _

_Tiny puffs of the white stuff was falling from the sky in clusters. Focusing her optics, she zoomed in on one single fluffy speck and gasped. It was so beautiful... a microscopic crystal. Its minuscule spines stretched out like a star, every twist and branch of it perfect. So much detail in such an insignificant amount of... whatever it was._

_And millions of these masterpieces were literally just falling from the sky. Ion clouds just spitting them out like they were nothing. Her systems still hadn't realized the temperature drop. _

_The very idea of so much beauty being possible stunned her. Maybe Cybertron still did have hope of recovery. Surely something containing such beauty could perish. The femme grinned, not noticng that she'd never put her mask back up._

_She stared up into the sky, her optics still magnified to maximum. Her gaze locked onto one little puff and she studied it as it descended. Closer and closer the crystal descended until it finally landed with a wet little plop onto her revealed nose-plate. She giggled like a happy sparkling, frowning in puzzlement at the same time. _

_It just exploded. The little crystal, so seemingly solid, simply erupted into a soft little puddle on impact. She twirled around, for a few seconds forgetting her two-mech audience, her arms spread wide as she tried to catch every puffball in the sky. _

_She hardly noticed that the other two mechs were dividing part of their attention to actually performing the mission._

_Youngling-ish curiosity overwhelmed her and the normally professional young femme stuck out her glossa to taste the strange white flakes. They were sweet, not as sweet as silver; dry at first before suddenly they were a tiny bit of wetness and then nothing at all._

_"What in the galaxy are you doing, femme?" Dreadwing asked, totally perplexed._

_The spy froze in her spot. She felt the ecstasy leech out of her frame. In the back of her processor she could hear the sound of her carrier's ancient tape recorder rewinding as she processed the mech's confusion and tried to figure out an answer to his question._

_"Um..." Her quest for an appropriate excuse for her actions ceased abruptly as her systems finally made one shocking discovery. _

_Her gold optics went wide in shock, excitement, and puzzlement. She ran over to Skyquake, her plating rattling against her protoform. In that moment, all logic and reasoning fled her mind and her only conscious thought being: cold! The Prussian blue and black spy pressed her tiny frame into his side for just a few astro-seconds before she grinned, bouncing away excitedly, her systems still over-energized from the silver drops._

_"It's so COLD!" She practically squealed, dancing in the freezing cold fluff, her denta chattering as her systems attempted to adjust, "W-what is th-this stuff, Sky?"_

_As she asked, she - not so covertly - snuck another piece of the candy out of the box she still held clutched in her hand._

_"It's called snow." Skyquake replied, laughing at her reaction to it. He grinned as he pressed a candies - he'd snuck them past her when she'd huddled up to him - into his mouth. As a second thought, he tossed one in his twin's direction, "It's frozen acid rain... Do you like it?"_

_"Oh, yes!" The femme replied enthusiastically, hopping up and down in this 'snow', enjoying the feel of her pedes just sinking into it. Suddenly she stopped and looked at Skyquake, squinching up her face. "Acid can freeze?"_

_"You're jumping in it, aren't you?" Dreadwing pointed out the obvious, his tone practically screaming 'du-uh!'._

_"Well..." She tried to think of a snarky retort, failed, and pouted, "Yeah..."_

_Another silver drop made its way into her hand and she looked at it with her helm cocked, a mischevious twinkle in her optics. She could see another remark about to escape Dreadwing's stiff face-plates. So in one fluid motion she bounded up to the blue and gold jet, leapt high enough to look him straight in the face, and -grinning all the while - stuffed the lolly into his mouth, effectively silencing the jet as silver-induced bliss distracted his processors._

_"Candy makes people happy." Giggling, she bounded away and winked at Skyquake her plan having worked quite nicely. The green jet pushed out his lip, pouting, while holding out a begging hand. His deep engine made a high-pitched whine. _

_The little Prussian blue, over-energized femme hugged the blue-tinted cyberrylium box to her chest, shaking her helm. Her lips were pursed and her gold optics showed that she was very much struggling to refuse the turbo-puppy face Sky was giving her._

_"They're mine!" She said sounding like a guilty sparkling trying to persuade them and herself that it was okay to be as selfish as she was currently being. "You gave 'em to me, and I ain't sharing!"_

_She tripped and stumbled over a mound of snow, unable to see where she was going as she walked backwards so she could face the two jets._

_"Awww..." Skyquake whined, still holding out his hand as they slowly continued walking and side-trackedly surveying the moon. His wonderful ruby optics grew wide and he had managed to force coolant into his optics. "Pwwweeeaasse?"_

_Her little engine growled somewhat pathetically in the cold air. Scowling at him, she unwrapped a silver drop and glared at it contemptuously before throwing it at the mech, who leapt for it. Landing with a crash and a flurry of white, Skyquake grinned up at her from where he sat on his hands and knees revealing the candy caught perfectly in his denta._

_She and Dreadwing laughed at the green jet's antics. She shook her helm in mock reproof. "Silly."_

_Truth of the matter was, she could never say no to her best friend. Never. She just didn't have the strength, courage, or desire to. And she probably never would. And as she beamed at her ginormous, playful jet commander, the femme decided that she was perfectly content with that._

**Post-mission**

_**/Mission Report - Operation Far Moon/**_

_**/0542-Seventh Rotation-Thirteenth Orn-Second Quartex-Twenty Ninth Vorn-Third Offensive/**_

_**Warning: Any abnormal contents in this report are purely resulting from the awesomeness of Protihexian silver drops. **_

_**The dark side of the moon: a magical environment emersed in the beauty of unending twilight and glittering diamonds falling from the sky. We - aka: Sky, Dread, and myself - saw no signs of hostile activity, excepting of course, the excess of candy and icy cold agony by over-exposure to harsh meteorological conditions that dazzle the optics and frazzle the systems. Little frames weren't meant for such an environment.**_

_**There really is no silver in the galaxy that quite amounts to the wonders of Protihexian silver, and no silver drops as good. But that's beside the point. Dreadwing found the most adorable baby photovoltaic pussycat. But he and Sky wouldn't let me keep it. It took 'em a long time to convince me though. It was reeeaaalllllyyy cute!**_

_**I love photovoltaic pussies... Such pretty bio-lights... Sorta like mine and Ravage's. Ooh! Commander 'Wave, since I couldn't keep the other kitty, could I keep Ravage? Please?**_

_**Anyway, we also found a field of frozen sapphires. It was infested with glitch-mice. They were kind of rusty and gross. From what we could tell, there were no strategically valuable places on this beautiful moon, and as a major in the Decepticon army with the backing of two commanders I would strongly object to bringing our disgusting, gross war to its perfect surface.**_

_**I would also advise consuming Energon before devouring a whole box of the best silver drops in the galaxy. 'Cause otherwise you go nuts... But I'll bet you kinda managed to notice that, boss...**_

_**Can I plleeeeaassse keep Ravage? Photovoltaic kitties are soooo cute! Maybe we could integrate one of the organic planet's holidays, like the 'Christmas' or the 'Birthday'... That would be fun. Then you could buy me a pussycat! That would be super fun.**_

_**Anyhoo... *salutes* **_

_**Major Tera out.**_

_**/data:image-shinyCUTEkitties/**_

_**/data:image-EWgrossrats&prettyflowers/**_

_**/data:image-DreadwingmeetssilverdropYummy/**_

_**/data:image-Skycatchingcandy/**_

_**/data:image-stuffs/**_

_**/data:image-missionystuffs/**_

_**/End Report/**_

_Soundwave read the report slowly. Then he reread it. And behind the opaque purple visor, the silent mech blinked. _

_Letting out a long vent, Soundwave's helm slid down to his hand. Pinching the bridge of his helm spike, the mech groaned inwardly. He wondered if his plan of molding this youngling femme into a perfect masterpiece was the stupidest thing he'd ever tried to do. _

_He was beginning to believe that it truly might be._

_The stupidest thing he'd ever tried to do._

_But he was going to keep trying. Until it worked. And then she __**would**__ be his perfect masterpiece. And it __**would**__ be worth it. Glancing at the images on his screen, Soundwave read her report for the third time._

_Hopefully._


End file.
